The fleet was gone, their lifeline severed. A hollow-eyed Erik dragged himself back to the Viking camp outside York.
When the grim news spread, Ragnar and his closest men erupted in fury, vowing to slaughter every last member of Northumbria's royal house.
"Brothers," Ragnar thundered before the assembled host, "our retreat is cut off. There is but one path left to us — to fight to the death!"
There was no recrimination in his tone. Instead, he poured his rage into a speech of searing power, his voice rising and falling like a war-drum. Words that could have festered into despair now caught fire, transfigured into vengeance. By the time he fell silent, the remaining twenty-one hundred Vikings were shouting with renewed fervor, bound together once more.
Among them, Rurik gave a faint, hidden smile. The first stage of his design had succeeded: the wolves had been starved just enough to sharpen their fangs. Now came the next step — the conquest of a kingdom.
To his mind, the Northmen were like wild wolves. A belly too full dulled their claws; only half-hunger made them truly deadly.
Meanwhile, within York's stout walls, jubilation reigned. Troops escorted a long train of wagons to the western bank of the River Ouse, ferrying captured stores into the city.
Prince Ælla, clad in mail and astride a white horse, rode at the center of the procession. The townsfolk thronged the streets, shouting his name. From windows, young women tossed down blossoms. White and pink petals whirled through the air; he caught a few in his hand and lifted them to his nose. The fragrance was delicate, strange, unlike anything he had known.
So this is the taste of victory…
At the royal hall he found his father, King Ælred, presiding over nine ealdormen. The talk was of taxes and revenues.
By long tradition dating to Rome, Britain's kingdoms reckoned wealth in silver. A single silver penny weighed about 1.46 grams and bore the king's likeness. One Anglo-Saxon pound — about 349.9 grams of silver — was worth 240 pennies (20 shillings, each of 12 pennies).
Last year, Northumbria had prospered: fair weather brought rich harvests, and the crown's income, when reckoned in coin, reached thirteen hundred pounds of silver — the richest year of Ælred's reign. But fate was fickle. The sudden coming of the Vikings had driven the treasury to the brink of collapse.
In less than three months, half the realm had been ravaged, especially the fertile lands of Leeds and Sheffield. This year's tax revenue might reach only five hundred pounds — and only if the invaders were swiftly crushed. Otherwise, even that hope would vanish.
"Father. My lords."
At Ælla's return, the ealdormen bowed. The king, seeing his son unscathed, asked at once how much treasure had been taken. Was there truth in the rumors of three thousand pounds of silver?
"Only one thousand and thirty pounds of silver," Ælla replied, "and fifty-seven of gold. The rest was ironwork, wool, and food."
With a weary sigh, he admitted that one ship of Northmen had fled downstream under a hail of arrows, likely heavy with silver. More treasure lay at the river's bottom with the burned wrecks. Recovery would be slow, if not impossible.
"Not enough," Ælred muttered, pressing his fingers to his eyes. He had counted on the raid's success to scatter the invaders. Instead, they stood firm, thirsting for battle. The war stretched on without end, and the prize they had taken would not sustain it.
War was a bottomless pit for silver. Even the royal guard of three hundred was proof: each man required a byrnie of iron scales, helmet, square shield, sword, a few sets of clothing, boots, and the yellow surcoat worn over armor — together worth three pounds of silver.
After the slaughter at Manchun, only a quarter of the guard remained. To rebuild it would cost over seven hundred pounds for equipment alone. With wages and training besides, the total rose to a thousand pounds — four-fifths of the crown's annual income.
"Has it come to this?" Ælla whispered.
His first thought was new taxes. But the south had been ravaged; little remained to take, and pressing too hard would drive men to flee into Mercia.
If no more could be taxed, then the only recourse was borrowing. Ælla urged his father to seek a loan from the Church.
"Let me think on it," Ælred murmured, troubled.
The monasteries of Northumbria were rich in land. They paid no tax, yet exacted tithes — a tenth of all produce — from their tenants. Their coffers were often fuller than the king's. But Ælred had borrowed from them five times before, and never repaid in full. More than once he had mortgaged land in exchange, ceding tax revenues with each acre lost.
A kingdom that gave away its lands would one day be ruled by the Church instead of a king.
One ealdorman proposed: "Borrow now, sire. Once the Northmen are driven off, summon a Witan and levy a special tax to repay the debt."
But another, by name of Pascal, offered a shocking thought: "If the war cannot be won, why not parley? Let the Vikings depart to raid Mercia. We have little left for them to take."
"You dare!" Ælla burst out, livid. "We burned their fleet at Humber with our own hands, and you would open the gates for them? What next — tribute? A king's ransom in silver?"
To pay Danegeld was unthinkable. No English kingdom had ever stooped so low. Only centuries later, in 991, would such a precedent be set, when the mighty realm of Wessex — then lord of all England — paid the Northmen ten thousand pounds of silver for peace, and again three years later with sixteen thousand more, until it became a chain that bound them fast.
The council argued long, until Ælred, weary and cornered, seized upon Pascal's counsel. He ordered him to ride out under a flag of truce — to open negotiations, but more importantly, to learn what the Vikings truly sought.
Pascal blanched, realizing too late the trap of his own words. With a funereal expression, he trudged out of York and toward the Viking camp.
At the gate he named himself, then waited. And waited. Hours passed; by the time dusk neared, he had been left to stew five long hours. He began to wonder if they had forgotten him altogether.
At last someone roused him from uneasy slumber and led him eastward through the camp.
The Vikings jeered at his fine clothes, mocking as though he were a rare beast on display. Some shouted strange cries to startle him; others shoved him roughly.
Then they brought him to a broad meadow where a crowd gathered around a towering machine. With a thunderous crash, it hurled a boulder skyward, like the stone of some one-eyed giant from legend, and sent it screaming into the distant forest.
Crack.
Pascal watched in horror as the stone smashed through trees as though they were reeds. Birds scattered in alarm.
"Oh, God," he whispered. "The savages mean to batter down our walls."